A river that winds a history that twines
by chrnoskitty
Summary: From Quonehtacut to New Netherlands to finally, Connecticut, the history of a sleepy little state hasn't always been so sleepy. Throw it into the realm of Hetalia, and you've got a whole bushel of apples; be it the good, the bad, the sweet, or the sour.


**1614**

It wasn't a pleasant day, but neither was it unpleasant, either. The clouds above turned the sky a gray that threatened for storm, the air heaving with unshed rain. Thick, and cloying. This deterred the sailors none. The crew of the _Onrust_ were stubborn, anyway. Their first vessel had been wrongfully consumed by flame, and, rather than being deterred, they had simply postponed their exploration.

For many months, while they gathered the timber and supplies, to create a completely new vessel. Now, sailing up the Fresh River wasn't her maiden voyage, but she was still a young craft. Which coincided well with the hearts of those aboard the vessel, one Adriaen Block, full of all the youthful vigor and rowdiness of an adventure of the age, the perfect accompaniment to his nation; the Netherlands.

Now, of course, Adriaen didn't know that the curious man who picked a constant brawl even while managing to be a shameless flirt, was his nation. It was the furthest thing from the explorer's mind; the duties of being the first to sail this river, and manning a craft, took up precedence most of the time. "You think it's gonna storm, soon?" Adriaen asked, tossing his head to indicate the sky; further up it was darkening ominously.

The impending storm was becoming inevitable.

And the neutral day was turning out none-too-well.

The Netherlander nodded response to the explorer. "Really soon. Can we get her 'round that bend up there, before it starts?" Though the words made it a question, the inflection made it a statement; No sooner had the thought left the Dutchman's mouth, than a subtle shift in steering was felt by all those attuned to the vessel, and thus her direction on the waters, that would allow them to get to said bend.

With a bunch of other young, female children, she had been washing clothes in the river when she first saw them. The curious beast riding the water, lacking all the finesse something _meant_ to traverse such pathways would have displayed. Still, even when the other children froze, and fled the river, she stayed there. Entranced.

What a curious thing it was indeed! A canvas cloud was hauling it further up the river, and, there seemed to be plenty of persons darting two and fro, tugging at ropes and, even... even _tugging the cloud!_

It was amazing!

"Quonehtacut!" One of the stragglers hissed her name, motioning with her hands for the girl to come away from the river. "Come here, let's go back! Miyáwin and the others will understand!"

The girl, known as Quonehtacut by everyone, due to mostly a poor sense of humour by those who raised her and, her own tendency to never stray to far from the place of a same name, shook her head. "_Mutu_, I... I am going to follow them! Can't you see, even from here? They're paler than me!"

"They are?" The other child asked, scrunching up her face and looking off into the distance, where she could see one of them scurrying about on the back of the strange creature. His shirtsleeves were pushed up, and, sure enough, even in the low drizzle that had just begun, there was still enough light to see quite a noticeable difference.

"Yeah? See? Anyway, take this for me, alright? Bring it back, and... I don't know. Say I ranned after a rabbit of something," Quonehtacut said, shoving her still dripping remnants of the chore at the other, darting up the river, into the surrounding woodlands, following the only course the beast would have to take.

That had been six hours ago. Now even the faintest sun had drifted away, and there weren't even stars to light the path. She tripped many times, balance hard to maintain by the thick overgrowth and slickness of many seasons' past fallen leaves.

An hour before the sun had set for the evening, the sky had finally opened up. Rain pelted against anything and everything, sharing the same lack of mercy for both living, plant, animal, and inanimate alike. Nothing was spared from the merciless torrent, and Quonehtacut could only grumble as she wiped her bangs away from her eyes for the umpteenth time, as she followed the journey of the explorers.

Oh! The questions she had for them! Why were they so pale? Where did they come from? What was it like on the other side of the sunset? Where did the river go to, had they traveled the whole thing?

The questions were the driving force that, even when she heard the forest around her go silent, the growl of some not too far-off wild creature prowling about for its next meal, her curiousity was the force that kept her trudging on; slicked up to the collar with mud and no doubt coated in brambles and other nasty treasures that she would be berated for later.

Getting the _Onrust_ moored had been a complete and utter nightmare. The rain had started out slow just when they had disembarked, and were with half a mind to set up pavillions, but first that had to keep their sea-lass from running away on them. Which would have been easy, had they not been the first venturers into the area, and thus, responsible for constructing the creations that would keep their vessel in place.

So, while they would have liked nothing more than to strike a fire and while away the night with conjecture about the rest of their journey, they instead were wrestling the wind for the lines and ropes to keep the _Onrust_ in place.

It was to this visage that Quonehtacut got her first, close-up glimpse at those from the ship. The storm had caused them to linger longer in the elements, making sure that their ship (and now lodgings, as it was far too muddy to set up the pavillions) would be secure for the evening... or however long they decided to stick around, when, (and if), the weather cleared up.

The sound of a twig snapping underfoot startled Quonehtacut from her sleep. It had been the weirdest dream, ever! She doubted even the Medicine Man of their tribe had such dreams; in it, she had been chasing a spirit. A spirit that only she could see, up the river. The spirit and herself, had been running on opposite sides of the river; she didn't recall looking into the water to see the reflections, but she knew that the spirits was not there. . . And then when she had looked, she had seen-

Gah!

Another fallen branch snapped under heavy boots, and a thick voice called in some warbled language she didn't understand. _Oh no, Oh no, Oh no,_ A frantic mantra passed through her head, as she scrambled to stand upright, and get out of the impending discovery by - well, who knew. It could have been the men from last night, though she had only few and far away glimpses at them, or, she could have inadvertently, in her quest, stumbled into another's territory.

Another shout in that garbled language, and more crunching of nature beneath boots, (Didn't they realize how loud that made them sound? The game wouldn't come back for days because of this!), Quonetacut panicked. And, in such a state of panic, she did the only logical thing she could think of.

She shimmied up the nearest tree, and tossed an acorn onto the head of one of the explorers.

"Hey!" Amber eyes narrowed, and glared straight up into her tree. "What was that for!"

Staring down at the curious person so many feet beneath her, the first (and most logical reaction ) was to simply stay still, and gape like a fish.

"What? Can't speak?" The man below didn't seem at all impressed with her, though she was absolutely _fascinated_ by him. And it wasn't even the fact that his feet were encased by what must be two-ton dead weights to create such noise, or the fact that the rest of his clothing seemed completely impractical and yet oh-so-amazing, or that his hair was cropped so short and that it managed to stick up in peculiar spikes.

No, it was that... "Y-You know my tongue?" She called down, from her quite comfortable perch up in the tree, utterly perplexed at how she could understand what, only a few moments ago she had believed to be an incomprehensible language.

"What?"

"You speak my language? I-I couldn't understand you when I watched you tether your beast last night. H-How'd you get a cloud to pull it?"

The Netherlands couldn't help it; he bust out laughing. "A-A cloud!" He spluttered, incredulously; Quonehtacut pursed her lips in distaste.

"Yes, a cloud. You know, the white things that scurry across the sky?"

Realizing that this little girl was completely serious, the Netherlands drew his laughter into reign. "I like you, kid. So, what's this place called?"

"This... place?"

"Yeah, you know. The land area," The Netherlander said, opening his arms wide to indicate the dense forest surrounding them to clarify. Ever since she had let it slip, this odd girl in native garb, that she had been watching them since last night, he wanted to know something.

"Ummm... It doesn't have a name?" Quohnetacut hazarded a reply. What an odd question that was! And he had laughed at her for her cloud one. At least _there_ was a _legitimate_ curiousity. Not some dumb question about the land.

"Oh?" That was odd. He had been sure he had felt that certain, peculiar presence. The one that told a Nation that there was another of their kind around. It had been fainter, and a bit diluted, but he had still been rather certain that he had felt it. "Well, what do they call you?" He asked again, the same question, really, but only with different words.

"Quohnetacut." She replied, simply, and he smirked. "Why are you smiling... mister?"

Though the Netherlands had never heard of that name before this day, it clicked. Here was another soon-to-be territory of the New World, though they barely knew it themselves, yet. "Come down here, Quohnetacut, and I'll tell you," He said, still grinning that same grin.

The sun of the next day had already begun to rise by the time the Netherlander was just wrapping up all he had to say. Tones of gold and orange bathed the world in their subtle hues, and the river that they sat beside sparkled with a calm serenity, constantly lapping at the banks; a give and take trade of treasures.

"...So, I can't die?" Quonehtacut said, furrowing her brow as she splashed her feet idly in the river. The mud from the storm of last night had already dried, caked on and falling off in undignified clumps, but she still looked like a wild creature, something that would never be suited to _real_ diplomatic work.

But then, what did he know? The same had been said initially about the little lad England and France had found toddling about these lands, and from what was being said, he was shaping up to be a fine little man. "Well...," the Netherlands said, not wanting to lead this possible little territory completely astray, or into doing something reckless. "...No, and yes."

"Huh? What do you mean by that?" The little, would-be, territory asked, blinking dark eyes up at him, as she, completely uncaring of the river dirt and elements, lay back with a soft 'plop' in the bank aside the river.

"I mean," The Netherlander said, throwing customs of the era to the wind and sitting down beside the girl in the slightly wet dirt with a soft 'squelch' of his own. "That... well, take me for example -"

"-Take you where?"

"No, it's an expression. So, take me for example. I'm a...," He spoke softer here; already having explained the importance of keeping an 'otherworldly' task/gift a secret when Adriaen had left to collect more firewood; fruitless at the time as it had still be pouring and a blaze could barely be coaxed from the sodden kindling, but so useful for all other purpouses, too. "Nation. And, well, if some random person comes up to me and just, sticks a sword through my midriff, well, it's going to hurt quite a bit, but I'm not going to _die_ from it."

"...But you just said."

"I'm getting to that. As a Nation, conventional means can't kill u- me. I'm not quite sure how it works for your kind, kid. However, don't get that in your head that you're _immortal_. Sure, you're probably gonna live for a hella long time compared to humans, but if you don't have a _people_, kid, it's not gonna go well from there for you."

A good while of silence passed, while Quonehtacut tried to process the new information; blinking only every few seconds, to show that there was still someone behind those dark eyes.

"It sounds complicated."

"It is."

"Why."

A shrug from the Netherlander. "Who knows."

"No... I, meant. Why can I understand you, but not him?" She asked, re-posing her query from their first meeting, indicating to Adriaen, who had taken it upon himself to add this little excursion to their ships log; One that the Netherlander beside her would later snatch from the books, in the depth of night.

Certain events, in history, didn't always need to be recorded.

Another shrug. "It's just another curiousity of being one of us." A pause, in which a look between Nation and citizen was held, and the Netherlander began to pick himself up from the ground, fruitlessly wiping the mud from his backside for posterity's sake. "Anyway, kid, we've got some more exploring to do. Catch up with you later."

* * *

Translations:

Quonehtacut = Connecticut (Land of the winding river / place beside a tidal river)

Mutu = No

Author's note: I thank you deeply if you actually read this. As it's going to be OC-centric (Connecticut history), I'll be happy if even one person does. (And yes, I feel it belongs on , rather than FP, because it's series-related OC... hope you can understand.) Thank you for your time!


End file.
